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[BGC] Representative of GaonMir, Lee Dong-ho, “GaonMir Will Be Judged by Users by Presenting a Creative Game”

  • Saturday, December 31, 2016, 11:00 pm
  • ACROFAN=Hyung-Keun Kim
  • hyungkeun.kim@acrofan.com
From November 17 to 20, an International Game Exhibition 'G-STAR' was successfully held in BEXCO, Busan Metropolitan City, with much attention from game industry officials around the world. Held in every November, 'G-STAR' has been a festival place for many people related to games by arranging a year, expressing gratitude to fans, and introducing new games and technologies that will be presented later.

The host city of 'G-STAR,' Busan is trying to show the appearance reflecting its name 'the city of game' on the basis of know-hows accumulated by hosting 'G-STAR' for many years after 2009. At the center of its movement, a lot of game businesses that are trying to realize dream at Busan are also joining.

Busan is continuing many activities with Busan IT Industry Promotion Agency for supporting the game businesses showing those active movements, and 'Busan Global Game Center (BGC),' opened in September 2015, became a facility for game industries in Busan. BGC is established for fostering game industry specialized to Busan and Gyeongnam area and supporting its inroads into global markets. With BGC as a launch pad, Busan City and Busan IT Industry Promotion Agency are creating new ecosystem for specialization, development and independence of region game industry through integrating game companies, attracting offshore companies, fostering startups, and training developers.

Hence, Acrofan met game industries entered in 'Busan Global Game Center (BGC)' and listened to stories of what dreams they are trying to realize in Busan.

 
▲ Acrofan heard the story about future goals from Lee Dong-ho, a representative of GaonMir.

GaonMir is a mobile game company founded in January 2015 and currently has about 5 employees working for it. In January 2016, they released the project that received the support from Smart Venture Institute and Korea Institute of Startup & Entrepreneur development (KISED) last year with a name ‘Sliding Puzzle’. In November 2016, it launched a game called ‘Fantastic’ in Google Play Store, Apple App Store, One Store, etc.

“I came to Busan when I was working in Seoul, but at first, there was clearly a difference in development environment and developers’ treatment. So, I established GaonMir with the developers that I’d ever known, because we decided to join hands in developing games by ourselves and making a better development environment.”

Lee Dong-ho, a representative of GaonMir, explained that since the development has proceeded and the company moved to Busan Global Game Center (BGC), it gradually grew in size. For an advantage of moving into 'BCG', he mentioned that it is possible to get the latest news in Busan as soon as possible about issues such as development, business, and education.

The Sliding Puzzle, which was selected by Google Featured since its release, combines a fantasy-style character with a sliding-style number-matching game. It moves the character along the way instead of digits by matching the way. 'Fantastic' is a game in which a stick is stretched and then rolled over to the exact position and a user can pass by crossing the stick. Users can compete with other users by putting their records on the server.

 
▲ 'Fantastic' is a game in which a user moves after stretching a stick and then rolling it over to the exact position.

"Our most confident part is networking technology. The area of game server-client is not popular program area, but since I have know-how that is gained from 10 years of server programming, I have plenty of preparation for networking in the upcoming work. "

In this way, he emphasized the company's advantages and expressed his desire to challenge MMO games. GaonMir's plan is to introduce a strategy simulation game based on RPG genre as well as large-scale combat.

"In the first place, we are thinking about MMORPG for the next game, and this will play a big role in preparing future games for us. In the future, we want to develop a large-scale military simulation that deals with large-scale battles in which a user plays a specific role. As know-how for A.I. or multi-play will be needed, we plan to continuously develop games and accumulate know-how.

In addition, the company, GaonMir, expressed the desire to be evaluated as a company that makes interesting games and games that people should enjoy. To do it, the company will continue to present creative games and receive evaluations from users.

At the end of the interview, he did not forget to express gratitude to the users. He said, "Because of the love of users so far, GaonMir has been able to get a good reputation, and we could have been thinking about continuing to develop games. Please pay attention to GaonMir's future, which will continuously present and develop interesting games."

Meanwhile, under the support from Ministry of Culture and Busan City, Busan Global Game Center (BGC) fosters game industry specialized to Busan and Gyeongnam area and supports its inroads into global markets. At BGC in Busan Cultural Contents Complex (BCC), under the close cooperation, Busan City and Busan IT Industry Promotion Agency are creating new industry ecosystem for specialization, development and independence of region game industry through integrating game companies, attracting offshore companies, fostering startups, and training developers. For more information, refer to Naver Blog (blog.naver.com/busangamecenter) and Facebook (facebook.com/busanglobalgamecenter).

 
▲ Lee Dong-ho said that he wants the company to be evaluated as a company that makes interesting games and games that should be enjoyed.